Tray tables are commonly used to provide commercial airline and other vehicle passengers with a surface for eating, drinking, working, and for convenient placement of items to be accessed during transit. Conventional aircraft and commercial vehicles arrange passenger seating in rows. Tray tables for use by the passengers are typically designed to have a single tray table surface that is connected to a framework that allows the tray table surface to be rotated upward and downward. The tray table is typically stowed in an upright position against the seat backs in front of the passengers. To use the tray table, a passenger will unlatch the tray table and rotate it downwards into a horizontal position so that the tray table surface creates a tabletop directly in front of the passenger, or even partially over the passenger's lap. When the passenger is finished with the tray table, the tray table may be rotated upward and returned to the stowed position.
While this conventional design is useful, it creates an inconvenient obstruction to other passengers, and even to a passenger using a tray table, during ingress and egress of the seat rows. For example, an airline passenger sitting in a window seat may need to exit the seat row to use a restroom or retrieve a personal item from an overhead bin. If a passenger in the middle seat is using a tray table, then that passenger would need to pick up the items from the tray table surface and stow the tray table in order to allow the window passenger to pass. This act may need to be repeated when the window passenger returns. There is currently no room within a seat row for a person to pass between a tray table that is in use and the passenger using the tray table.
It is with respect to these considerations and others that the disclosure made herein is presented.